The Mourning Mail (final release candidate #7)

Chapter 35

It was fall now – the ghostly apparitions, skeletons, and spider webs of Hallowe'en had begun taking over shop windows and front yards – and dusk had already yielded to full darkness as I opened the door to the Uber. To boost my confidence that I hadn't just gotten into a car driven by someone wishing me harm, I chatted up the Uber driver as I climbed into his Prius, and we headed off. He was friendly and quite talkative. His name was Antara. Born in Morocco, he'd been here since he was four and had no trace of an accent. He showed me photos of his wife and four children. He'd taken the pictures at a birthday party for one of his kids, and they all looked genuinely happy. Driving for Uber was his second job—his regular employment was as a mover for a local "three men and a truck" moving company. He was trying to earn extra money for a larger home to move his family.

Comforted that I was safe, I put my time to good use as I rode back to my motel room. My burner phone was in my front pantsuit pocket, and I had to unfasten my seatbelt to reach it. I turned on the Prius' dome light so I could input a few speed dial numbers from my original cellphone into the burner phone along with my essential contact information. I didn't do a wholesale copy of the data because if something happened to the burner phone, I didn't want to lose too much that was personal.

Antara stopped at the light, waiting for the green. I barely caught the old GMC heavy-duty stake-bed truck bearing down on us from the corner of my eye. The vehicle wasn't out of place in the heavily-industrial area we were passing through. But in the flash of that moment, I mistook the approaching dark blob as merely pulling up alongside. Antara was checking his Uber app for new ride requests, and likely never saw it.

I was still squinting at the burner phone screen when I heard a tremendous bang, and the window beside me exploded. Suddenly, everything around me was spinning and tumbling and bouncing in a kind of surreal slow motion. Tiny crystals of shattered glass glittered in the air as the light from the streetlamps was narrowed and almost blotted out by the nose of the truck that hit us, replaced by the glare from one of its headlights. My seat and the floor beneath me tilted up at a crazy angle, slamming me against the inside door panel on the opposite end of the seat cushion and then rolling me over onto that panel. I instinctively curled into a fetal position. The entire vehicle rocked on its passenger doors, popping out and smashing the glass in the windows now grinding on the asphalt as the car finally settled.

The world became deathly silent for just a moment. Then, total blackness.

And there I was, with Eddie, Mom, and Dad, sitting cross-legged on the top of our headstone. Not too long after we'd interred Mom here, I'd found out that it was best to come just before dawn. If you caught a day right before the mowers came, the just-beginning-to-curl tips of the grass blades glistened in the walkways' indirect lighting. Sprinklers running during the night would bedew the entire area. The sparkling surface lay undisturbed by anyone else's footprints for more than an acre surrounding you.

And then, you'd wait for that first glow of daylight sneaking up over the trees on the horizon as the morning breezes began their stirring. You could jump up and sit on Dad's side of the marker as you swung your heels on the backside of the monument. From there, you'd watch as tiny slivers of light began spearing through the leaves of the lower branches, now rustling slightly, on our stalwart oak. I would pretend that the start of this day was new to me. I was witnessing the earliest dawn of man, the first sentient being ever to see our rising sun, marveling at the glorious sight.

The light rays were becoming more insistent, and I closed my eyes tightly against their harshness. I squinted as I slowly opened my eyes again, but this time to the crumpled and chaotic scene surrounding me. I suddenly realized that I had been screaming throughout, and stopping my shrieking helped ease the throbbing in my head. The moans I heard weren't from me—they came from somewhere to the front and right of me.

The sound of a heavy-duty engine, maybe a diesel, interrupted the momentary calm, very close and revving up. My stomach felt queasy as the Prius rocked a little. The violent collision had crushed the driver's side rear door inward far enough that I had no room to sit up. As I tried to right myself, my left hand began bleeding from the sharp edges of the bent metal and broken glass. I was completely disoriented and couldn't understand for a moment what was up and which was down. I felt entrapped and intensely claustrophobic. It took me several moments to realize that the brightness streaming in wasn't from the car's dome light; it was coming from a halogen fixture mounted on a pole now directly above us. I could hear sounds from the street—traffic, the murmur of voices, and sirens approaching.

I looked towards my new up, and I could see through the gap left when both side-curtain airbags deployed. The crash had blown out the entire rear window of the Prius, giving me an escape route. I touched my head and knew it was bleeding on my right side. Pain was shooting through my left hip at regular intervals, and my left wrist was sore and had no strength, collapsing under me when I tried to push myself up with it. The sense of being in a dream persisted, and I felt an emotional detachment from anything my logic told me was real.

I saw a pair of muscular forearms reaching through the opening between the airbags. I raised my hands toward them, and they caught me underneath both arms to help pull me out. Two athletic men carried me to the sidewalk and sat me gently on a blanket. It was hard to make out the individual voices. My head was swimming, and my temples throbbed with a pounding headache. Still, I heard someone say through all the confusion, "The ambulance is on its way," and "Is there anything I can do for you, ma'am?"

A sudden wave of panic came over me when I realized I still had that unregistered .38 revolver in my purse. I tried to stand up, but concerned hands stopped me, and I tottered back to the ground. "I need my purse; my medications are in there," I fibbed. It's funny what your brain thinks important when you are in a situation like that.

"It's pretty mashed up in there," a disembodied voice said, "but I'll see if I can find it—is there anything else you need from the car while I'm looking?"
"Yes, I have two cell phones, mine and my work phone. If you can find them, I would appreciate it so much."

I watched as a slender, rangy young man leaned way down into the rear window area and, after rummaging around, pulled out my purse, then one phone, and finally the other. He brought them to me, kneeling and placing my handbag beside me on the sidewalk, holding one phone out to me and laying the other on top of the purse. In my dazed state, the thought came to me—I wanted to kiss him. But I was still bleeding and thought better of it. All I could do instead was say, "Thank you."

"You are most welcome. I hope you're going to be okay..." the young man said.

"I'll be fine," I said. "How's the driver?"

"He's in terrible shape, ma'am. He seems to be breathing but not awake, and he's pinned in. The fire department is going to have to get him out. We're trying to keep pressure on the places we can see he's bleeding, but he needs to go to a hospital soon."

"What happened? Who hit us? Where's the truck?"

"It was a hit-and-run, ma'am. We were behind you and saw the truck veer off from the side street straight at you. We thought it would hit us, too," he said. "After he hit you, his engine was smoking, and the radiator was spraying anti-freeze all around, but he backed up and went down that other street. He only made it a few blocks, leaving the truck in the middle of the road and taking off on foot. Then a dark blue Dodge Charger picked him up, and they drove off; it must have been going ninety miles an hour. Some of our friends followed him down there when he first left here, but they were on foot and couldn't catch up to him. Look, the police, fire department, and ambulances are here, and they're telling us we need to move out of the way. I wish you the best, ma'am."

And then the young man was gone, folded into the crowd before I had even asked him his name.

"My God...," I said as the thought occurred to me for the first time. My head was still spinning and aching, and I know it wasn't working quite right—but had somebody just tried to kill me?